Perkins, the Fakeer. Edward Sims van Zile
Zile
Perkins, the Fakeer
PREFACE
In offering to the public in book form the following tales, from the pages of THE SMART SET, the opportunity is presented to the author of answering the questions that have frequently been asked of him and the publishers, since these stories first appeared in print, concerning their origin. He is not, and has not been, the deus ex machina.
One Perkins, a Yankee who lived for fifty years in India, and became an adept in mysteries rejected by the Occidental mind, is responsible for the curious psychical transpositions described in the following pages. I am not at liberty to say much about Perkins. He has control of a power that is so peculiar, and I may say erratic, that I dare not offend him. If, in this preface, I should tell the public too much about Perkins, he has both the ability and the inclination to work me harm of the disastrous sort herein described. I do not dare to defy him.
I have taken the liberty of telling these stories in the first person. My choice of this method will at once commend itself to the thoughtful reader; and, what is more important, I am sure that it will satisfy the amour propre of Perkins, the Fakeer–a consummation devoutly to be wished.
E. S. VAN Z.
Hartford, Conn., March, 1903.
I.
When Reginald Was Caroline
That night the wife of King Sûddhôdana, Maya the Queen, asleep beside her Lord, Dreamed a strange dream.
CHAPTER I.
TRANSPOSED
But what a mystery this erring mind! It wakes within a frame of various powers A stranger in a new and wondrous world.
To begin at the beginning: the tragedy or farce–whichever it may prove to be–opened just a week ago. I turned on my side, as I awoke last Wednesday morning, to look into my wife's face, and, lo, I beheld, as in a mirror, my own countenance. My first thought was that I was under the influence of the tag end of a quaint dream, but presently my eyes, or rather my wife's, opened slowly and an expression of mingled horror and amazement shone therein.
"What–what–" groaned Caroline, in my voice, plucking at my–or perhaps I should say our–beard. "Reginald, am I mad–you look–where are you? What is this on my chin–and what have you done to yourself?"
Whether to laugh or swear or weep I hardly knew. The bedroom looked natural, thank God, or I think that at the outset we should have lost our transposed minds even more completely than we had. The sun came in through the window as usual. I could see my trousers–if they were mine–lying across a chair at the further end of my dressing-room. It was all common-place, natural, homelike. But when I glanced again at my wife, there she lay, pale and trembling, with my face, beard, tousled hair and heavy features. I rubbed a slender white hand across my brow–or, to be accurate, the brow that had been my wife's. There could be no doubt that something uncanny, supernatural, theosophical or diabolical had happened. While we lay dead with sleep our respective identities had changed places, through some occult blunder that, I realized clearly enough, was certain to cause us no end of annoyance.
"Don't move," I whispered to Caroline, and there flashed before my mind a circus-poster that I had gazed at as a boy, marveling in my young impressionability at the hirsute miracle that had been labeled in red ink, "The Bearded Lady."
"Don't move," I continued, hoping against hope that by prompt measures I might repair the mysterious damage that had been done to us by this psychical transposition. "Shut your eyes, Caroline, and lie perfectly still. Don't worry, my dear. Make your mind perfectly blank–receptive to impressions. Now, we'll put forth an effort together. I'm lying with my eyes closed, and I am willing myself to return to my own body. Do likewise, Caroline. Don't tremble so! There's no danger. Things can't be worse, can they? There's comfort in that, is there not? Now! Are you ready? Use your will power, my dear, for all it's worth."
We lay motionless, blind, silent for a time. That I should gaze into my wife's own face when I opened my eyes again I fondly imagined, for I had always been proud of my force of will. Caroline, too–as I had good reason to know–possessed a stubborn determination that had great dynamic possibilities.
"Ready!" I exclaimed, presently. "Open your eyes, my dear!"
Horror! There was my wife gazing at me with my eyes and pulling nervously at my infernal beard. As she saw that I was still occupying her fair body, my eyes began to fill, and a man's hoarse sobs relieved my wife's overwrought feelings.
"Is it–oh, Reginald!–is it reincarnation, do you think?" she questioned in her misery.
"Ah, something of that nature, I fear, Caroline," I admitted, reluctantly. "It's a new one on me, anyway. But it can't last. Don't be impatient, my dear. It'll soon pass off."
But even as I spoke I knew that I was using my wife's sweet, soft voice for deception. Whatever it was, it had come to stay–for a time at least.
"I think, Reggie, dear, that, if you don't mind, I'll have breakfast in bed."
Like a flash, Caroline's remark revealed to me the frightful problems that would crop up constantly from our present plight. Number one presented itself instantly; I had an important engagement at my office at 9:30. If Caroline remained in bed I couldn't keep it. Then it came to me that if she rose and dressed I should be in no better case. Dressed? She would be obliged to put on my clothes, anyway! What other alternative was there?
"I think, Caroline, dear," I suggested, gently, "that we'd better wait awhile before we make our plans. It may go away suddenly. A change may take place at any moment."
"It came in our sleep, and it'll go in our sleep," said my wife, confidently, and I was struck by the gruffness that a firm conviction gave to my voice. I had never noticed it when I had been in full and free possession thereof.
"If we could only go to sleep," I sighed, glancing again at my trousers and suppressing a harsh expletive that arose to my beautiful lips.
"I couldn't sleep, Reginald. I'm sure of that. I feel a horror of sleep, but I need something. Perhaps–oh, Reggie, it can't be that!–but I can't help thinking that I want a–a–cocktail."
Caroline hid her borrowed face in my great, clumsy hands.
It required an effort of memory for me to put myself into sympathy with her present craving. I hadn't thought of a cocktail since I had awakened. It was only once in a very great while that I indulged in an eye-opener. But I had been out very late Tuesday night–in fact, it had been this morning before I had reached home from the club–and I was not, upon reflection, altogether astonished at the wish that my poor wife had expressed with such awkward coyness. But to grant her request demanded heroic action, and I hesitated before taking what might prove to be an irrevocable step. If I left the bed under existing conditions, a temporary psychical maladjustment might become permanent. Then, again, I realized that my little feet felt repelled by the chill that would come to them if exposed to a cold draught that blew through a window open in my–or, rather, Caroline's–dressing-room.
"Go into the bathroom and take a cold plunge," I suggested to Caroline, to gain time. "It's more bracing than a cocktail."
"You ought to know, Reginald," she remarked, in my most playful voice.
Her ill-timed jocosity struck me as ghastly.
"Caroline, dear," I began, "we must beware of recriminations. 'It is a condition, not a theory, that confronts us,'" I quoted, mournfully. "If we should fall out, you and I–"
"If we only could!" sighed Caroline.
"Could what?" I cried, in shrill falsetto.
"Fall out, Reginald," she answered, grimly. "Can't you think of something else to try? Really, it's too absurd! What is the matter with us, Reggie? Are we dreaming?"
I